Certainly, travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living. - Miriam Beard
Disclaimer: This entry WAS started nearly a week ago...maybe longer...and despite my best effort it has still taken forever to get anything posted. One difficulty was the repeat loss of updates to the draft I had started. Oh computers, the love I have for you is sometimes sorely tested by your capricious nature. But here goes nothing! If I'm lucky, I'll get a bunch of other photos uploaded today. I'm not going to hold my breath though...
Disclaimer: This entry WAS started nearly a week ago...maybe longer...and despite my best effort it has still taken forever to get anything posted. One difficulty was the repeat loss of updates to the draft I had started. Oh computers, the love I have for you is sometimes sorely tested by your capricious nature. But here goes nothing! If I'm lucky, I'll get a bunch of other photos uploaded today. I'm not going to hold my breath though...
Thursday was our last day at the cabin. We had an amazing time. I finally allows myself some time in the lake. Or maybe it was the heat that drove me to find a cool solution and its hard to look past the draw of a lake when it's so beautiful and so close. Andrew figured out how to tether me to the pier while I laid on one of those floaty raft things and read ghost stories of the Great Lakes. Bliss. And a great way to cool off before running through the rest of the day.
Andrew found a really beautiful route to take us from Atlanta to our campsite in Mackinaw City. Turns out the state of Michigan provides these wonderful off road parks that allow for spectacular locations for leg stretching and dog walking.
Andrew and the boys and Lake Huron.
Aydan :)
This little gathering of shells was so perfect.
Mother Nature, you are gorgeous.
Lars and his sand castle.
Lief and his sand castle.
Aydan and his sand castle. Anyone see a trend? Defenses built first. They all started with protective walls and started the little buildings inside later...but that was as far as hey got since we were all hungry and ready to head off to our first campsite.
But first! I need to use the bathroom again and I came out to find my sweet husband sitting like this. So in love with my family.
The boys got out to that great big rock that I had seen earlier. They were creating a photo I had wanted them to pose for all on their own. Ah, the faux bros, I love them!
First campsite! Aw yeah! Tee Pee campground in Michigan was quite nice and we had an absolutely amazing view of the Mackinack bridge. This was truly our first time "living" in the camper. I think it went quite well :)
Oh the inconveniences of camping! So funny! The campsite had wi fi and the boys wound down from their day with their devices.
Mackinaw bridge at night is so beautiful. I am not good with night photos at all but I think it would be impossible to see something so pretty and not want to photograph it. Or drive across it...
Which is exactly what we did. Shortly after midnight this group got the urge to take a drive across the bridge. Boys and dogs packed up and we were on the bridge in about 10 minutes. I admit that driving that close to the edge of what appeared to be a black abyss definitely spiked my adrenaline. Yikes.
Friday the boys wanted to go to a water park inside some hotel. I td them I would find something way cooler. And, of course, I did. The historic Mill Creek Discovery Park was great! Super friendly staff, dog friendly, lots of activities for us to do and places for us to walk and learn about this little place that had a huge impact on the development of the surrounding area. We chose to walk around and check things out before doing any of the more organized activities.
Leaping from one bench to the other.
Now Lars' turn.
All three of the boys leaping.
Dog pile on the bear next to the dog...yeah.
Andrew needed to take a picture of crumpets, the lion-bear-wolf-frog dog next to the bear at the play ground
And we also found a frog. You can see the resemblance, right?
Lars and the real bear :)
Old saw mill and the river that provides the power to run it.
The boys enjoying river time.
It's just so pretty!
The saw mill from above.
Aydan was chosen to help with the demonstration of how logs were cut before the saw mill was built. Not a fun job for sure! But it was a super cool presentation :)
Thank goodness we could bring the dogs along and an extra heaping of thankfulness that they were so well behaved! Little kids played with them and adults told us how cute they are :)
The adventure tour was an extra part of the park that we couldn't miss out on. There is a rope bridge roughly 200 feet in the air and is called the canopy lookout bridge. After the bridge we continued the hike to the zip line segment.
Lief went first.
Followed by Lars.
Then Aydan.
Me too! Andrew took all the pictures so we sadly do not have his photo but I can assure you, he had a great time too :)
Fifty foot look out tower provided quite a view. 200 years ago, when this mill was in production, you would have been able to see from where we were standing all the way to the island without the aid of a birds eye view. Most of the trees in the park are "young" by tree standards/
The boys tried out the rock climbing wall while I took the stairs to the top of the tower.
These boys are so fun to hang out with. We of course had to check out the thrift store in Cheboygan and the boys were their goofy selves. This is the anime tribute pose.
Our first steps to making it feel like home! You know, messy kitchen and dishes piled up in the drain board :) This was our second night in Mackinaw City, our first real overnight adventure away from any place like home. The camper was a mess. We had so many things we didn't really have homes for and we were expecting two guests for the weekend as well. Thankfully we had my little hiking tent to use as a spare room and the boys were able to sleep in the bigger tent we had for them to share while the adults slept in the camper.
Still in the cleaning process. Of course once it was all cute and organized I spaced on taking a picture. But it does look cozy and sweet when it's all cleaned up. Efficiency will be something we learn while we continue our journey. Andrew and I spent three hours tidying our camper but it was well worth it. Lisa and Mike arrived around midnight and we didn't stop talking our faces off until somewhere around 5:00 am.
Post three hour nap and Lisa is ready to rock out this day on the island! It was a fun morning getting all of our stuff ready and together. Coffee, sunscreen, bug spray, poop bags, water bottles and all kinds of other island essentials were packed up into Mike's bag (and a few in mine) and we were ready to go.
Why would you not want to hang out with these guys? They were so great to have around.
A collage of photos taken while on the island. Joann's Fudge was a particularly nostalgia inspiring location. My mother LOVED fudge from Mackinack and this was her place to buy from. I maybe brought home five slices. My apologies to those that aren't sharing this goodness with us. I can't partake either - at least not too much. I did have a tiny bite of the Dark Dark Chocolate Salted Caramel. I'm only human.
These dogs are getting a constant workout.
Andrew spoiling the pups with leftover soup from our lunches followed by a walk by the lake where Crumpets realized she had the biggest water bowl she'd ever seen to drink out of. Rosie was a bit more hesitant but still took her own gulps from the lake. Crumpets' other realization of the day: her love of horses and seagulls. By love I mean her crazed, near uncontrollable barking and lunging at these animals whenever she saw them on the island. Only horse drawn carriages by a large body of water made for LOTS of opportunities for Crumpets to visit crazy town. She did respond well to our direction of calming her but it took nearly the entire day to get her there. Thanks for the arm work out, dog face.
Rosie on the other hand was more comfortable hiding from everything or finding shade at every opportunity. I believe this picture with Mike is an example of both.
View from the Fort.
Another view from the Fort. Hard to believe that the desire to defend this area created an historical landmark that would become a tourist attraction. One thing I found interesting is that the grassy area in the picture was once the land where soldiers grew crops for food while they were stationed at the fort. Different life styles indeed.
Why hello there, pretty strawberry shake. Mike's smile definitely indicates destruction for that shake.
Shade and water, two things we seek out for the dogs as often as we can. Crumpets was totally on high alert the majority of the day and greeted everyone that came by our table with a snarly growl. Fun for everyone! :P
The boys asked and were allowed to pet the horse. Not having Crumpets with us made that much easier.
A street side photo of Joann's fudge shop. Memories of family trips aplenty found here.
The trees in the forest lean nearly perpendicular to the level ground where we were walking. Craziness and definitely an inspiration for climbing...I guess that's why they have all the signs posted to discourage the urge.
When scaredy pants Rosey falls asleep on the boat you know she's been good and tuckered out.
Well, we did have it all cleaned up...I guess it's challenging to keep any area you live and love in super tidy. I'm sure a time will come when the camper will be tidy and I'll grab a photo then too :)
So, this was a great idea and I know I have better pictures of the four adults together but I'm so eager to get this posted that I'll add better photos later. The signs say it all. What a fun few days we had!
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